The Mistress of the Badges
by Nemesis8791
Summary: Many years have passed since Ash Ketchem from Pallet Town began his Pokémon journey. Now a new generation of trainers must fight against the criminal Team Neo and the sinister Pokémon Empress to save the world.
1. Chapter 1

**An unusual Visitor**

It was a new day, and the warm sun rose over the Johto region. David Newman from Violet City yawned and stayed in bed for a couple of minutes, before he decided that it was about time to get up. He took a quick shower and put on his favorite clothes, a red T-shirt, a pair of black shorts and dark sneakers. When he was dressed, he sprinted down the stairs. He was not quiet down when he came to meet his two Pokémon, a Teddiursa and a Buneary. David bent down to them and caressed them gently.

"Well? How are you both? Did you sleep as well as I did?" asked David. "Shall we take our daily walk?"

Immediately he got affirmative and joyful answers from his furry friends.

"Follow me then," said David. Before he left the house, he called out in the direction of the kitchen: "James, I'm out with my Pokémon!"

"Okay," he got an answer. "Be careful. These days there are a lot of wild Pokémon around outside."

"But James, they are there all the time", replied David.

David's uncle, James, a man at the age of sixty with short, bluish gray hair, came out the kitchen and looked at David for a while, like a concerned father would look at his son. "Just take care, okay? Wild Pokémon are not all friendly, as you always believe."

"I'll be careful, I promise," said David, and left the house with Teddiursa and Buneary. Once outside, he deeply inhaled the fresh air and made his way to his first destination. It was just the house next door. The girl who lived there, Julia, was a friend of David since their early childhood. In the recent days there were rumors in Violet Town that they were a couple now, but both of them denied it vehemently.

David rang the bell of family Litton, and less than a second later a girl opened up. She had green hair and wore a long white dress, so that she resembled a Gardevoir from afar.

"Whoa, that was quick!" marveled David.

"I was already waiting for you", said Julia. "Shall we go?"

"Ready, when you are", replied David.

Julia turned around and called out: "Chikorita, come here!"

Just a little later, the small green Pokémon with the single leaf on its head came to the door. And as always it greeted David by jumping into his arms with full strength.

"Hey Chikorita, how are you?" asked David. Once again he was surprised by the power that the small creature possessed.

"That's enough, Chikorita," said its owner half joking and half seriously. "If you carry on like this, you'll crush him!"

"Chikorita!" said the Pokémon and returned to the side of its owner.

Julia Litton has always been fond of beautiful flowers. When her parents finally allowed her to keep Pokémon, and decided to buy one as birthday present for her, she immediately chose Chikorita. And since that day they were never apart from each other again.

"Where do we want to go?" asked Julia, while Chikorita was clinging to her body.

"Let's go to Route 32," suggested David.

"Fine by me," said Julia. "How would you like a little race competition?"

"Let's go for it," said David and set out to run. "The loser is a lame Psyduck!"

_**PKMN**_

They reached Route 32 within half an hour. This time, David won their race. When Julia caught up, they entered the Route, slowed down their pace and strolled silently side by side.

"I'm so excited about our journey," said Julia.

"Yeah, me too," replied David.

David turned sixteen just a month ago. To be honest, he thought that it was way too late to start the journey. The Great Ash Ketchum from Pallet Town already began his trip when he was just ten years old. But James had firmly insisted that David completed his education first before starting his journey.

At first David hated his uncle for this decision. But now he knew that it was only for his best. If he found out against his expectations that he actually didn't like the job as Pokémon trainer, he still could become a breeder. Of course this idea was not entirely altruistic. James himself has become a famous Pokémon breeder after he gave up his job as trainer.

"Richard and Michael just finished their preparations," said Julia casually.

"Mike should remember the food," said David. "I can already see him and his Pichu wail about hunger."

Julia laughed out loud. "Yes, you're so right," she said.

Meanwhile, the two teenagers arrived at the end of the forest road and continued along the street. From a distance, a red sports car approached. And when it drove past, the two teenagers saw a woman with long blond hair on the driver's seat.

"Did you see that?" asked David and stopped.

"Yes, that was Rachel Mc Crane," replied the girl. "She's not only a beauty, but also the Gym Leader of Olivine City. She's a role model for all who want to specialize on fire-type Pokémon. What's a VIP like her doing in a place like this?"

"I don't know," said David and turned around. "Let's go find out!"

_**PKMN**_

When David and Julia arrived back home, they saw the red car in front of David's home. At that moment, the door opened, and both Rachel Mc Crane and James came out. They exchanged a few words with each other and then parted. While James went back into the house, Rachel walked to her car. There she saw the two teenagers.

"Hi," she greeted the boy. "You're David, right?"

"Yes," replied David hesitantly.

"And you're probably Julia. James told me a lot about you," she said. "Oh, by the way, I'm Rachel Mc Crane…"

"Yeah, we know," said David. "You're a lot on TV… Do you know my uncle well?"

"You can say that," answered Rachel. "We're good friends. I'm afraid I have to leave now. It was nice to meet you. So, until next time!" With those words, she got into her car and drove away.

"I'm going back, too," said Julia. "See you later, Dave."

David nodded and then turned to his Pokémon. "Okay guys, how about breakfast?"

_**PKMN**_

A few minutes later David was sitting in the kitchen, eating a bowl of cornflakes with cold MooMoo Milk, while Teddiursa got a small glass of honey and Buneary ate some Pokéblocks. James was nowhere to be found. But that wasn't unusual. He was probably in his office, working on his new book. James began to work on it a few months ago, but held everything about it secret.

"Dave, can I talk to you for a minute?" James had suddenly entered the kitchen completely unnoticed, and David jumped at his voice. "Oh sorry, I startled you."

"No, it's fine," said David. "What is it you want to talk about?"

James sat down. "You're a big boy now," he said, his voice sounded sad. "You're going on the trip of your life. Enjoy the days ahead, they'll never come back."

"I will," said David.

"I would have liked to say goodbye when you leave," James continued. "But I'm afraid that something crossed my plans."

"What's wrong?" asked David.

"Oh, it's nothing to worry about," James reassured. "There are just some people who want to have my opinion on some scientific questions, and that's why I have to leave today."

"Where are you going?"

"To several different places, starting in Olivine City" said James. "So I'm doing a journey throughout the region, too, just like you." James stood up, patted David on the shoulder and left. David continued his breakfast, but for some reason he felt uneasy now.

_**PKMN**_

"Pichu, Thunder Shock!"

"Dodge, Teddiursa!" David shouted hastily, but it was too late. Teddiursa was hit by the attack of the small yellow electric Pokémon, before he could jump to the side. It stumbled for a short while and fell to the ground. David immediately ran to him. "Are you okay, Teddiursa?"

In response he got a weak "Teddi…"

David called Teddiursa back to his ball and stomped angrily towards the Pichu-coach. "Are you insane? How could you let him attack with such strength? You could have hit me!"

"What do you mean?" the Pichu-coach asked innocently. It was a boy in David's age with blond spiky hair. They had made an appointment for a spontaneous fight in the afternoon. "It was an ordinary Thunder Shock attack. Besides, my Pichu has a quite high accuracy. You couldn't have been hit under any circumstances."

"But still," protested David. "You'd better get your Pichu under control, Mike!"

Michael laughed out loud. "Now you're insulting me! Are you saying I'm a bad Pokémon Trainer? What' wrong with you today? Why are you so furious?"

David paused for a while until he calmed down. "Sorry, I don't know what got into me."

"Apology accepted," said Michael, grinned and put an arm around David's shoulder. "To be honest, I understand you very well. This is the so-called hometown-sickness. All kids in our age get it. The only cure to this is to start a journey, meet other people and see interesting things. But you know what? It could be even worse; we could have been those unlucky kids living in New Bark Town."

"Yeah, you're right," David said laughing.

"Don't worry, in two days we're out of this place. And in the mean time, I know something to cheer you up," said Michael. "Let's go to a café and have a nice sundae."

"No thanks," replied David.

"Hmm, you're sure?"

"Yeah," said David. "I'm going home and preparing my stuff for the trip. But thanks again."

"No problem," said Michael. "And if you change your mind, just give me a call!"

David nodded. Then they went their separate ways. They were friends since their early childhood. He liked Michael's happy nature. He was always optimistic and cheerful, and only rarely unhappy. But at the moment David did not want to be in his company. He was way too much occupied with the strange behavior and the sudden departure of his uncle.

A car is approaching sound of David ripped from his thoughts. As he turned, he saw the red car he had seen that morning. It stopped right next to him, and a window opened.

"I need to talk with you," said the driver.

"I need to take Teddiursa to a Pokemon Center," said David.

"Get in," said Rachel. "I'll take you there!"

David hesitated for a moment and got into the car. "So? What do you need to talk to me?"

"Was your uncle acting strange lately?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, did he do anything he hasn't done before?" asked Rachel.

"No, not that I know," replied David. "In recent weeks, he seemed a bit scattered. Maybe it was because he was so busy..."

"Busy doing what?"

"He was writing on a new book. Therefore he bought a lot of reference books or borrowed them." David said.

"What's his new book about?"

"As far as I know, it's about the influence of badges on Pokémon, or something like that. He didn't talk much about it," said David. After a pause he asked: "Is James in trouble?"

"Why do you ask?" asked Rachel, and glanced at David, before she focused on the road again.

"He behaved very strangely today, after you were there," said David. "And then he left so suddenly..."

"He left? Where did he go?" Rachel interrupted him.

"I thought you knew," said David.

"No, I don't. I came here because he called two days ago because of something urgent," said Rachel. "But when I arrived this morning he didn't remember having called. And then I made a strange discovery," Rachel said, turning to the left.

"Hey, the Pokémon Center is the other way!"

"I know," replied Rachel. "But first I want to show you something, at your home."

_**PKMN**_

In less than five minutes they arrived at their destination. When Rachel entered the house, she steered straight for a glass cabinet in the living room, where James kept the eight badges from Johto, which he had once earned as a young man.

"It's still there," she said with relief.

"What do you mean?" asked David.

"Has James ever told you something about this?" Rachel asked as she pointed a finger at one of the badges without touching it. It was an additional one to the eight regular badges and looked almost like them. But while the others had been engraved with the crest symbols of the gyms, this one was completely blank. It was just a piece of shiny metal with a pin on the back.

"James said it was his lucky charm," said David. "But all I know is that it has been given him. I don't even know by whom."

"He told me today that he wanted to give it to you for your trip, so it brings you luck," said Rachel.

"Really? I almost can't imagine. He treated this thing like a sanctuary. He would never have given it out of his hand."

"Hmm, I don't get it. If James treated it like his sanctuary, why would he leave it behind?" Rachel murmured thoughtfully. "Unless…"

"Unless what?"

But Rachel did not answer him. Instead, she said: "I must leave now. But I'll come back in three days or maybe in four. Promise me that you don't leave, not before I'm back. Do you promise?"

"Do I even have a choice?" David asked.

"I'm afraid not. But you have to trust me, I will be back," Rachel replied, smiling. She left the house, climbed into her car and drove off.

"Hey, you said you would bring me to the Pokémon Center!" David called out, but her car had already disappeared.


	2. Chapter 2

**First Contact**

Rachel Mc Crane did not return, not after three days, and not after four. Soon a whole week had passed, and slowly David suspected that he had been forgotten. His friends grew more and more impatient as the time passed on. On the fifth day they met in a café in Cherrygrove City and discussed their further plan.

"I suggest that we leave," Michael said, and touched with the straw around in his iced tea.

"But I promised her to wait," protested David.

"Oh come on," said Michael. "If it was so important, why couldn't she at least make a call? Probably it's nothing at all, Rachel has already forgotten the matter, and James has some nice holidays somewhere on a beach."

On the one hand, David wanted to leave, too. But on the other hand he didn't want to break his promise. He just couldn't decide and turned to the one who had been listening to at this time in silence. "What do you think, Rich?"

The boy shrugged his shoulders. "Don't know", he replied tersely.

Richard Vaughn never was a man of many words, and when David had first met him, he thought that Richard wasn't able to. In general, he was a very quiet and balanced boy. He was very athletic, an excellent swimmer and had a great talent in dealing with water-type Pokémon.

"Great!" Michael said sarcastically. "Now that helped us very much."

"I make a suggestion," Julia spoke up. "We'll wait until tomorrow. If Rachel doesn't show up until then, we set off. Agreed?"

"Well, okay," David said after a short hesitation.

"I think I can live with," said Michael.

"Fine," Richard agreed, too.

The four friends paid their drinks and left the cafe. While Julia, Michael and Richard made their way home, David and separated from them by a little train with Teddiursa on Route 31. He went into the tall grass and released his Pokémon from his ball. Just as he wanted to start training, he suddenly heard loud cries. David followed the noise and came to a clearing where he saw a man in a dark uniform beating up an Alakazam with a stick. While doing this, he uttered insulting words against the Pokémon.

At this sight, David immediately became furious. What he hated the most was violence against Pokémon, in any forms. He decided to help that Alkazam, stepped forward and interrupted the man.

"You there! Stop that immediately!" he shouted.

The uniformed coach stopped the beating and turned to David, while his Alkazam stood up as in a slow motion. At the sight of the Pokémon and his trainer David immediately got a queasy feeling, and he began to regret not having interfered. The coach was a sinister-looking man with an angular face and a three-day beard. But what scared David much more was his Alkazam. It was different than any other Pokémon David had seen in his life: It had red glowing eyes and a very aggressive expression on its face. In each of his hands he held a silver spoon and banged them against each other in regular cycles. That was a sure sign that it was waiting to attack.

"Who do we have here?" asked the coach. "A curious little boy sticks his nose in matters that do not concern him. I think he needs a lesson. Come on, Alakazam, Shadow Slash!"

Before David could react to the situation, Alakazam began to run towards him, while drawing a strange dark shadow behind it. Teddiursa immediately recognized the situation and stood bravely in front of David. But it had no chance against the strength of Alakazam. It was spun through the air and came hard on the floor. David ran back to look after it. At the same time Alakazam prepared for a second attack.

How can that be? How can this trainer let his Pokémon attack people? And what kind of attack did Alakazam use? These questions went through David's head, as he threw himself protectively on his Pokémon.

"Hey, tough guy, are you afraid to fight someone who's not weaker than you?" Someone shouted suddenly. Alakazam stopped on the spot. Together with his coach it turned toward the voice.

A young woman had appeared unnoticed. She was in her twenties, had long, snow-white hair and steel-blue eyes. She was dressed in a blouse of turquoise silk and a pair of white shorts. She possessed the most extraordinary Pokémon that David had ever seen. It resembled a girl in a white kimono with a red belt.

"You want to get some trouble, too?" roared the uniformed man. "Then I'll defeat you first and afterwards that nosey brat!"

The woman just smiled and replied calmly: "Bring it!"

Now the man was really furious and ordered Alakazam to attack the Pokémon of the woman with a shadow attack. Alakazam straightened up and hit his spoon against each other. Then, it suddenly rushed forward to ram his opponent. But the woman remained totally calm.

"Froslass, dodge and counterattack with Astonish!" The Froslass proved to be incredibly fast. Shortly before it was reached by Alakazam, it made a jump to the left and struck it from the side, and it let out a shrill scream. Alakazam was hit, yelped and flinched briefly. Neither the Pokémon nor his coach had expected something like that.

After a few seconds Alakazam had recovered from his fright, and tried again to attack Froslass with a new shadow attack. But again Froslass was faster and more agile. After five unsuccessful attacks Alakazam fell to his knees, exhausted and panting heavily.

"You really think you're great, don't you?" shouted the uniformed trainers. "You better watch out, it's not over yet!" Then he turned to his psycho-Pokémon and continued scolding: "Get up! You will show now who is better! Get up, or are you a weakling?"

And then something happened, what David didn't expect. The Alakazam, which was almost on the floor, struggled back up to his feet. Its eyes sparkled even brighter, and David believed to see a bright red aura around him.

"Now look at this," said the woman addressed to the Alakazam. "Your trainer probably brought you to fury. I'm really sorry, it's nothing personal, but I have to finish this now. Froslass, Ominous Wind!"

While Alakazam seemed to recharge for a big attack, Froslass began to perform a kind of dance. It whirled its arms through the air, and a strange purple cloud was growing around it. The moment Alakazam set out for his attack, Froslass shot out the cloud like a projectile. Alakazam was completely wrapped up in it, and a few second later it fell to the ground, unable to continue the fight.

The uniformed trainer took Alakazam back to his ball and stared angrily at the woman. His teeth were crunching louder than those of a Houndoom. "You're lucky that I don't have more Shadow-Pokémon, otherwise I would show you who's the boss here! But I won't forget you!" He gathered up his things and ran off.

The trainer walked to her Pokémon stroked it gently on the head and gave him a berry as a reward. "You fought well, Froslass," Then she turned to David. "How is your Teddiursa?"

"I think it will be okay," said David. "You really helped me out of trouble. Thank you. You have a really great Pokémon. It's probably very rare. I have never seen one like this."

"It's a Froslass, an ice-ghost-type Pokémon" replied the woman. "It evolved from a female Snorunt. And Snorunt can only be found on the Ice Path near my hometown, Mahogany Town."

"You're from Mahogany Town? Then you have probably already visited the gym," said David.

The young woman smiled involuntarily at his words.

"Did I just say something funny?" David asked.

"I'm the gym leader of Mahogany Town," she replied.

David suddenly felt that he was blushing. How could he not have recognized her? He felt really embarrassed. "That's really you!" he exclaimed. "You're Lara Kagan!"

"Yes, that's me."

"And what are you doing in this part of the region?" asked David.

"I'm actually on his way to Ecruteak City, where a meeting takes place," said Lara. "And since I was here, I used the opportunity to visit friends in New Bark Town. Actually, I thought it was safe here. The fact that Team Neo spread to here, is not good."

"Team Neo? Isn't that this criminal syndicate that does illegal experiments on Pokémon?"

"Yes, that's right," said Lara. "They catch Pokémon in large quantities and lock their hearts to make them more powerful and ruthless. This transformed Pokémon are called Shadow Pokémon."

"I've never heard that it was possible to lock a Pokémon's heart," said David.

"This technology was originally developed in a distant region called Orre," said Lara. "A few years ago the police there crush this criminal organization and arrested the members. But somehow Team Neo must have got its hands on that technology. And now Francesco, the son of Giovanni and head of Team Neo, wants use the Shadow Pokémon, to enforce his plans and to support the Pokémon Empress."

Only few things of what David just heard, was known to him. There were many questions he liked to ask, about the Shadow Pokémon, Team Neo or the Pokémon Empress.

"I shouldn't burden you with all that stuff," said Lara. "I don't think Team Neo will come back here. Come Froslass, we have to go now!"

Froslass, still holding the berries in its hands, hesitated briefly, as if she was thinking about something. Then she floated to Teddiursa and handed the berry to the little bear Pokémon. Teddiursa accepted the gift and cocked with his head, as if he didn't know what to do with it. He remained and watched as Lara walked away with Froslass.

"Come, we should go too," said David.

Teddiursa remained standing on the spot and said with a sad tone: "Teddi, Teddiursa."

"Now don't tell me you've fallen in love with Froslass," joked David. "She's not the right one for you, believe me."

Reluctantly Teddiursa began to move, as he would expect that Froslass would come back. It was almost as if Froslass had used Attract on Teddiursa. Only when they had reached the end of Route 31, Teddiursa returned to his normal state. With relish, it nibbled on the berry.

When David got home, he saw the familiar red car in front of his home. Rachel Mc Crane was casually leaning against it.

"Hi," she said when she saw him. Her voice was soft, but her expression was serious. "I'm sorry that you had to wait."


End file.
